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Ghostbusters II
Ghostbusters II is the 1989 sequel to Ghostbusters (1984) produced and directed by Ivan Reitman. It takes place in New York City, five years after the events in the first film. The sci-fi comedy film is about the further adventures of a group of parapsychologists and their organization which combats paranormal activities ("ghostbusting"). The sequel had what was, at the time, the biggest three-day opening weekend gross in history ($29,472,894, which is equal to $52,709,710 today), a record that was broken one week later by Batman ($40,505,884). Plot synopsis Five years after the events of the first film, the opening of the film Dana Barrett while taking a stroller with Oscar in it to Dana's apartment. While talking with someone slime on the wheel of the stroller start the stroller with Oscar in it to roll downhill. After a chase it stops right before a City Bus. Ray Stantz and Winston Zeddemore are regularly entertaining at childrens' parties which none of the kids even remember them. Meanwhile Dana visits Egon Spengler at his lab office building where he is conducting various experiments, which Dana explains what happened earlier and that she could use his help. Egon says he would like to have Ray help him on it. Dana agrees but said not to tell Peter Venkman as they are not on good speaking terms. While Peter Venkman hosts "The World of the Psychic" television show. After the show he is walking and he sees the Mayor and he tries to talk to him when Jack Hardemeyer (The Mayor's assistant) shows up and tells him to keep away from the Mayor. Meanwhile, Dana is working at Manhattan Museum of Art restoring paintings and her boss Janosz Poha is hitting on her all the time. While Ray and Egon are researching at Ray's Occult Books. Peter shows up at the store, and after using his abilities at getting information out of Ray, finds out about Dana's recent problem. The next day all three visit Dana's apartment, and Peter is bugging Dana as Egon and Ray are checking Oscar. Then the three ghostbusters head out to the street of the event. After check over the area and finding that something paranormal had happened based on readings, they start drilling the street. Later they do a reading and find its intense and someone has to go down there to get a better reading. Meanwhile, at the art Museum Janosz is working and all the sudden Vigo starts talking to him from the painting. He tells him he needs a child so he can live again. As that is happening Ray is going down through the street in the underground by wire. While the police show up to tell them that the story they gave doesn't check out, Ray finds out that there is a river of slime flowing under New York. The slime starts attacking him, and he screams begging them to pull him up. In the panic Ray kicks a pipe and the power to all of New York City goes out. While in blackout Dana at her apartment is visited by Janosz, claiming to be in the neighborhood and thought he'd stop by. The Ghostbusters, were found guilty of fraudulently digging on 1st Avenue. The Judge Stephen Wexler goes into an angry rant, which causes the slime that had been collected by Ray beneath the street to react violently. All the sudden the Scoleri Brothers appear and start destroying the courtroom. The Judge clears the charges and Egon, Ray, and Peter trap the Scoleri Brothers. The ghostbusters official reopen for business and they take out a large number of ghosts in the New York area. The ghostbusters had started researching and experimenting on what Peter called "Mood slime". It was shown that the slime reacts to threats and verbal abuse, however it also reacts to singing as they did a toast with a toaster where it would dance to the music. Peter then goes to the museum of art to visit Dana and while there Dana tells him about how it feels like the painting is watching her, which also they together notice Janosz is talking to the painting. Later that night while preparing Oscar to take a bath the bathtub filled with pink slime attacks. She runs with Oscar and goes to Peter's apartment and after telling Peter what happened, Peter calls Ray and Egon at the Firehouse, and they agreed to go to Dana's apartment. Egon also showed him history on Vigo and they also decided to go look at that painting the next day as well. The next day they head on in to the Art Museum and against Janosz's wishes photograph, and study the Vigo Painting. Later, Peter comes home to find Dana cleaned his apartment. He asks her out on a night on the town, and she says yes. Meanwhile after closing the Firehouse for the day, Louis asks Janine out for a bite to eat. She says that she can't as shes babysitting Oscar for Peter, however she invited him to come over at 8pm. He says yes. Meanwhile, Egon and Ray are looking over the pictures using the Spectral analyzer and they noticed not only is a living presence but the River of Slime. After that, the whole room caught on fire, but Winston came in and extinguished the fire. Egon, Ray, and Winston meet up with Peter, and Dana and ask him to join them as they go down in the sewers to look for slime. Peter says no so the three go down there. While down there they see impaled heads, and a Ghost Train which goes through Winston. Finally they find the River of Slime. Winston tries to measure how deep it is when the slime pulls him in, and he goes downriver. Ray and Egon jump in after him. Meanwhile Dana and Peter seem to be patching things up in there relationship at the restaurant and Janine and Louis are enjoying the time together at Peter's apartment. Later on Ray, Winston, and Egon get out of the sewers all covered in slime and fighting. Egon tells them to remove the cloths they are wearing, and then they lost they anger towards each other. They then look to find out that the River of Slime flows to the Art Museum. The Ghostbusters come into Armand's Restaurant where Peter and Dana were enjoying dinner. Noting that they were in they underwear and covered in slime the restaurant manager called the cops as the guys told Peter and Dana about the river of slime and the events. The cops take them away, and Peter goes along with them. Meanwhile, Dana comes to Peters place to see how Oscar is doing as the date is over. Janine and Louis were caught asleep on a couch together, however Oscar is fine in bed. Meanwhile, the ghostbusters meet the mayor at Gracie Mansion and Jack Hardemeyer is there being a jerk. The ghostbusters try to convince the mayor that the negativity of the city is making a River of Slime, and if people don't start being more positive the whole city is going to blow with supernatural activity. The Mayor didn't believe them and says treating people like dirt is every New Yorkers God given right. After the Mayor left, the ghostbusters talked about going to the press with the story, then Jack suggested to first tell the people down town. What Jack didn't tell them was that the people down town work for the Parkview Psychiatric Hospital a insane asylum. Meanwhile Vigo is talking to Janosz and a deal is struck that Vigo would be reborn as the baby for Dana and Dana would be Janosz's wife. Meanwhile, at Peter's apartment Louis, Janine, and Dana are watching a movie, when all the sudden a window in the bedroom opens and Oscar walks out onto the buildings ledge. Dana notices and sees the window up. She sees Oscar as a supernaturally powered Janosz takes Oscar. Dana leaves for the art museum while Louis looks for the guys. Dana gets to the museum which after entering the whole outside covers in slime. Inside Dana tries to take back Oscar while Janosz starts telling the plans Vigo has. After that, beneath the city, the slime raises causes massive mayhem as ghosts and monsters randomly pop out and terrorize citizens. The mayor getting desperate says to call the ghostbusters, which at that point Jack Hardemeyer tells him that he had the ghostbusters committed. The mayor then fires Jack and sends someone to get the ghostbusters, and at that point a slime eclipse happens outside. After that Louis is with the ghostbusters as they are leaving and Ray is explaining that Vigo is going to take Oscar and become reborn in Oscars body and they need to stop it. Then a few minutes later the ghostbusters get to the museum. They try to blast open the through the slime on the museum, but its to strong. The boys then get a idea that they need a positive symbol to lift the spirits of the people in the city. Then they get to the Statue of Liberty and Ray and Winston spray down the inside with the Slime Blowers and Egon sets up the controls to steer the Statue. They then started to play "Your Love Keeps Lifting Me Higher" over the speakers in the Statue. The Statue then started walking and went through the bay. Meanwhile, back at the firehouse Janine dresses up Louis in Egon's Suit and then he leaves on foot to help the guys. The Ghostbusters then were directing the Statue of Liberty through New York, cheering up the whole town. They get back to the museum now weakened, and inside Dana runs and grabs up Oscar as the Ghostbusters come through the roof. The first thing they do as Janosz rants, is hose him down with the Slime Blowers. All the sudden a hose ties up Dana, while Peter puts Oscar behind some stuff away from the action. Vigo reveals himself outside of the painting walking the visible plain. The Egon and Peter shoot at him and Vigo stuns all four of them. Vigo then gets the baby. Peter says a few comments which then Vigo Shocks all four again. Then the people start singing outside and are happy, which weakens Vigo and he goes back to the painting while leaving Oscar behind. Meanwhile, outside Louis shows up and starts shooting at the Slime Shell. Inside Vigo takes possession of Ray, and Winston uses the Slime Blower to drive Vigo out and back into the paint, and Egon and Peter Blast him til he disappears for good. Peter and Dana kiss, while Ray wakes up and is very happy. Ray then pulls up a very cheerful Janosz and they share the love. Then all four ghostbusters, Dana, Oscar and Janosz look at the painting that appears of the four ghostbusters and a baby. Then they leave the Museum. Development After the success of the first film and the animated series, The Real Ghostbusters, Columbia Pictures pressured the producers to make a sequel. However, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis and Ivan Reitman were uncomfortable with this as the original film was intended to be conclusive and they wished to work on other projects. Eventually, they agreed and created a script. Annie Potts was also working on her TV series, Designing Women, at the same time. Reportedly, some of the cast and crew were ultimately dissatisfied with the film as well as its box office reception. The Scoleri Brothers are played (uncredited) by Tim Lawrence and Jim Fyfe in latex suits with animatronic masks. Ostensibly, Tony and Nunzio are based on the real-life Scoleri Brothers, who once robbed Harold Ramis's father Nate Ramis' store. "The ghosts themselves were very loosely based on the fact that my father was a storekeeper who was once robbed and assaulted by the Scoleri Brothers." Some however have suggested that they might be based instead on Tony and Eddie Scoleri, who were convicted of robbing and killing a store owner in Philadelphia in the 1960s. None of this is known for certain however. The designs were created by the Visual Development Artist Henry Mayo (Credited) after extensive input from the Producer Michael Gross. Criticism The film received flack when released for not being as funny as Ghostbusters. It was also said to not be very child friendly due to the scary ghosts in it. Also, there were complaints that Janine Melnitz having a love affair with Louis Tully was not good for children to see and that it destroyed the relationship developed in the first movie between Egon Spengler and Janine and as it ran through the animated series. Because of this it forced a split in the timeline of the franchise into two canons, one based on the films , and one based on the first film and the animated series. Main Characters Dr. Peter Venkman Dr. Peter Venkman (portrayed by Bill Murray) Dr. Ray Stantz Dr. Raymond Stantz (portrayed by Dan Aykroyd) Dr. Egon Spengler Dr. Egon Spengler (portrayed by Harold Ramis) Winston Zeddemore Winston Zeddemore (portrayed by Ernie Hudson) Louis Tully Louis Tully (portrayed by Rick Moranis) Dana Barrett Dana Barrett (portrayed by Sigourney Weaver) Minor Characters *Janosz Poha (portrayed by Peter MacNicol) *Janine Melnitz (portrayed by Annie Potts) *Oscar (portrayed by William T. Deutschendorf and Henry J. Deutschendorf II) *Jack Hardemeyer (portrayed by Kurt Fuller) *Mayor Lenny (portrayed by David Margulies) *Judge Stephen Wexler (portrayed by Harris Yulin) *The Prosecutor (portrayed by Janet Margolin) Villain Ghosts *Vigo *Scoleri Brothers *Slimer (voiced by Ivan Reitman) *Titanic *Jogger Ghost *Mink Fur Coat Haunting *Ghost Train *Slime in Bathtub Attack Equipment/Vehicle *Uniform *Proton pack *Slime Blower *Trap *P.K.E. meter *Giga meter *Ecto goggles *Spectral analyzer *Ecto-1a Places/Locations *Firehouse *Manhattan Museum of Art *Dana's apartment *Peter's apartment *First Avenue *Gracie Mansion *Ray's Occult Books *Armand's Restaurant *Parkview Psychiatric Hospital VHS Release DVD Release Category:Ghostbusters II Category:films